Hou Yifan's astonishing result at Tradewise Gibraltar last week marks a highly significant break-through for women's chess. China's 17-year-old beat four elite grandmasters, outplayed the great tactician Alexei Shirov at his own game, and performed far above expectations.

Hou disappointed only in the blitz play-off for first prize against Nigel Short, who beat her 1.5-0.5 after she missed her chance in the puzzle diagram below.

The historic context is that 30 years ago there was a majority view that women would never reach the heights of male chess for a variety of alleged physical and psychological reasons, Then came the dazzling career of Judit Polgar, who scalped almost all the leading GMs in individual games, won elite tournaments, and reached the world top 10.

Polgar and her sisters Susan and Sofia were dedicated to chess from childhood by their father Laszlo, who believed that world-class skills could be acquired by a concentrated lifestyle. So the rationale changed as the sceptics argued that the family were a unique exception.

Hou's Gibraltar was in the same league as Polgar's teenage results, with a tournament rating performance over 2800, world champion level. Her overall ranking is still outside the top 100 men but, at 17 and with backing from China's ambitious sports programme, she will advance much further.

Her example will also be a stimulus for other women players, many of whom became GMs in the Polgar era but found a psychological barrier at the 2600 rating level, which Hou has decisively broken.

Short's 21...Nxc4? (Ne5) gave White the missed chance 22 fxe6! but after that Black made subtle use of his bishop pair while White optimisticallly tried for a Ng6+ tactic. At the end the simplest win is 37 Rxf3 Re2+ and Rxb2